Right, so I've made a majorly idiotic mistake and manually deleted some time machine backups from the Backups.backupsdb folder on my external HD. Now I can't empty the trash ("The operation canít be completed because an unexpected error occurred (error code -8003)"), and the backups are still taking up God knows how much space on my external HD.

Re-formatting my external HD would have to be an absolute last resort, as I have gigs of stuff on there that I'd have to find somewhere to back up to first (and my MBP HD doesn't have enough space to store it all in the meantime).

Hi, I am a new MAC user, I just bought a IMac and I started having problems getting the trash to empty.
I came across a app called Trash it. Not sure where I found it now but, if you Google search you should be able to find it.
Anyway I loaded and ran the app. If makes it own Trash Icon. I went into my original trash and selected all and drug it into the new Trash it. My computer did nothing for about a minute. I decided to reboot and when I did my Mac trash was empty.
I hope this helps you and a lot of other users. Dave Smith

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

Hi, I am a new MAC user, I just bought a IMac and I started having problems getting the trash to empty.
I came across a app called Trash it. Not sure where I found it now but, if you Google search you should be able to find it.
Anyway I loaded and ran the app. If makes it own Trash Icon. I went into my original trash and selected all and drug it into the new Trash it. My computer did nothing for about a minute. I decided to reboot and when I did my Mac trash was empty.
I hope this helps you and a lot of other users. Dave Smith

Thanks for the advice desmith1944, but this was one of the first things I tried and it had no effect.

Quote:

Originally Posted by grahamnp

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

grahamnp, you're actually a life saver! this totally did the trick, it emptied the trash on my drive and I haven't had to re-format it

I have so learnt my lesson with Time Machine - after the headache it gave me last night I may start using Carbon Copy Cloner instead. Either way, I'm going to partition my external HD and have a partition dedicated to backups instead of mixing my data with them!

Hi grahamnp!
I run into the same trouble with Mac: I manually deleted backups, but as soon as I plug in backup disk, I see my trash ful with what I deleted!
I don't understand what terminal to open. Could you specify the program name or describe all action step-by step as for dummy? I'll be thankful for the rest of my life. I hope you answer. Thank you!

Quote:

Originally Posted by grahamnp

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

I don't actually understand what you mean by your trash becoming full when you plug your backup drive in. Are you talking about the .Trashes folder taking up space on your backup drive? I don't want to tell you to do anything else without actually getting that straight because the command line allows you to delete pretty much anything, even stuff crucial to the operation of the computer.

So, I had the same problem: manually deleted old time machine backups (won't do that again) and then have a full trash folder when the external TM drive is connected, and reduced capacity on the TM drive.

Tried grahamnp's suggestion. Terminal prompted for my password. I entered that and then..... nothing. Terminal seems to have gone off to do something (ie wont take any further commands) but no change to the trash folder.....

tried it twice, pretty sure I followed grahamnp's instructions precisely.

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

Okay, so I'm attempting this solution and I type "cd /Time Machine Backups" (the volume name) into Terminal and it says "-bash: cd: /Time: No such file or directory"

Hi noticed you solved the issue of removing TM backup from trash, gone thro the same route but no joy, im a bit of a novice to Macs, what is the volume name on the part cd <<TM volume name>> ??? any help would be appreciated

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

Couldn't you delete only the "backup.backup" folder (or whichever folder you've deleted) instead of the whole .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive? Seems more safe to me.

__________________..:.::.:.:.::..:.: Oh, I get it. It's very clever :.:.::.:.:.::.:..:.::..:.::.:..:.::.:.::.:.::..DO NOT OPERATE YOUR COMPUTER UNDER THE INFLUENCE!

Couldn't you delete only the "backup.backup" folder (or whichever folder you've deleted) instead of the whole .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive? Seems more safe to me.

You could, but one of the issues is that it gets stuck at that point and you go no further. Deleting it moves it to .Trashes so if it won't delete itself after that, doing this will force it. Just make sure nothing else was in the .Trashes folder, it recreates itself automatically after deletion so losing it is not an issue.

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

Thanks for the help!! This worked like a charm!! I was dreading having to call Apple to get help with this, thanks again!

Hi! I'm having this problem - after typing in "ls -a", there isn't any files being displayed. But in my trash folder, the backups are still there. Where could I gone wrong? This is frustrating! It's taking up a lot of my space..

Quote:

Originally Posted by grahamnp

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

I'm having this problem - after typing in "ls -a", there isn't any files being displayed. But in my trash folder, the backups are still there. Where could I gone wrong?(

Which trash folder are you talking about? You type 'ls-a' to reveal the trash folder specific to your Time Machine drive, you do this when already viewing the root directory of the TM drive. You delete the entire .trashes folder itself, not the contents.

I've had this problem many, many times. I've had luck manually deleting the .Trashes folder on the Time Machine drive's root directory. It will automatically be recreated.

Open terminal, type "cd /Volumes" and then "ls" to display all volumes and "cd <<TM volume name>>" to go into the TM volume.

Type "ls -a" to display all files, the -a is because Trashes is hidden.

"sudo rm -rf .Trashes" should delete the trashes folder.

Careful, messing that up could delete the wrong thing. Also, this hasn't always solved the problem for me.

Time Machine seems to (rather annoyingly) just do it's own thing. I've had it delete the files on its own time before and the free space was back after a certain period of time. I have no explanation for it but it seems to have fixed itself.

-----

Not entirely related but a word of advice: it seems that you've got data on the same drive as your TM backup, and this is what is stopping you from reformatting. Generally not a good idea to mix backups and your data on the same volume.

I'm having similar issues but when I try to delete the .trashes folder I get the message: